Walk down the streets of Chinatown in any American or western European city and look around. She is there. Walk through the downtown streets, look in a shop window. She is there. Go to any city in China and open your eyes. She is there, too. Kuan Yin is the most ubiquitous Chinese deity – and the most loved. She is the living expression of compassion, whose gentle face and elegant figure form the centre of devotion in most Chinese homes and workplaces. Until relatively recently, she was barely known in the West and few studies had been made of her. This book, originally published as Kuan Yin by Thorsons in 1995, has been revised by Palmer. It falls into three sections: 1. The origins and evolutions of Kuan Yin in ancient China in early Buddhism, Taoism, and shamanism. 2. The Kuan Yin myths and stories. 3. Fresh translations of 100 Kuan Yin poems that function both as literature and divination tools.
